Indholdsfortegnelse for June/July/August 2021 i Esquire Singapore

Do not panic. This is your friendly neighbourhood Deputy Editor, Wayne Cheong. The other guy, that dude who usually writes this, he’s on a long sojourn so I’m here trying to fill some pretty big shoes. (Actually, the shoes are well-worn, kinda ripe. The lustre has faded but they’re still functional. But those aren’t my shoes. I’ve figured out quickly that everyone who takes on this role has to come into his or her own shoes.) What you have in your hands is the Summer issue. This is the issue of changes to come. We are living in strange times and just when we thought we were coming out of the pandemic, we stumbled and now-at this time of writing-we are in the throes of Phase Two Lite (with half…

“At Hermès, we are craftspeople. We work with material, we are craftsmen and women, we transform material we find in nature. We have to work with our hands and our senses,” Pierre-Alexis Dumas says as he explains the idea behind the maison’s intriguing watchmaking theme for 2021, ‘Textures of Time’. It is a notion that strikes at the heart of a house like Hermès, which works fundamentally with such sensuous and evocative materials as silk, leather and enamel. Yet it is completely fresh and surprising; the idea that time can be interpreted in textures has never been considered before. Time as art? Check. Time as emotions? Sure. Time as luxury? Overused. Time as textures? Never. So what exactly does Hermès mean by ‘Textures of Time’? “The major senses we use…

Though we aren’t supposed to drink wine like water (well, except Dionysus), they both have to be pure and unadulterated for us to reap their maximum benefits. Hence, look towards natural wines for a taste of fermented grape juice at its finest. Spa Esprit’s Drunken Farmer has already been introducing natural wines via pop-ups at Tiong Bahru Bakery Safari, The Butcher’s Wife and Open Farm Community’s special menus, and most recently at Le Vin, Levain. Now, Drunken Farmer has settled down at Common Man Stan; in the evening the day café is transformed into a natural wine bar and bistro. Its collection of tasty vino, curated by in-house sommelier Eduardo Bayo, is gathered from French, Italian, Chilean and Spanish winemakers, with some imported exclusively by Drunken Farmer. Spa Esprit owner…

Sun’s out and up, but there’s nowhere to go except the same old domestic attractions. So, take this opportunity to let the mind wander with books that promote armchair travel and conjure fantasy. They don’t just shade your face from sunlight, y’know. All titles are available at Kinokuniya. Klara and the Sun By Kazuo Ishiguro You’d think it’s impossible to top the Nobel Prize-winning The Remains of the Day but Ishiguro outdid himself and delivered a masterpiece worthy of nabbing another one in the literature category. The British Nobel laureate crafts an AI (artificial friend) named Klara who hopes to be loved and loves in return in this suspense-filled contemporary sci-fi piece. The humanistic nuances of a coming-of-age robot seem far-fetched but her existence here makes us question relationships and…

It’s everywhere by now. From luxury fashion houses with the likes of Prada and Gucci to brands such as Tommy Hilfiger and adidas, Econyl has become a synonymous material when it comes to sustainability in fashion. So convinced are these brands about its circular future that Prada, for example, is aiming to phase out its signature virgin nylon material for the recyclable Econyl substitute. For the uninitiated, Econyl is not a naturally occurring material nor is it derived from natural resources. It’s synthetic in nature and essentially nylon. But what makes it better for the environment is that it’s regenerated nylon derived from waste including fishing nets and fabric scraps. After sorting through and recovering all the nylon possible, the waste is then put through a regeneration and purification process…

Here’s a reminder if you need one: Puma’s no slouch when it comes to running. The sportswear brand may have a more consistent relationship with football and basketball, but let’s not forget its long-standing history in the competitive running arena. Together with his brother (the younger Adolf Dassler who started adidas), founder Rudolf Dassler helped to kit out almost all the German athletes with spikes during the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam. And once Puma was established proper, the brand helped make Olympic history with Armin Hary-known during the time as the world’s fastest man-as he won gold in the men’s 100m at the 1960 Summer Olympics. Fast forward to now, Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt still officially holds all of his records, all clinched while wearing Puma. Running may not…

If you Google the word Nalgene, the first frequently asked question the search engine offers is: ‘Why is Nalgene so popular?’ It’s a valid query. For the most part, the American brand makes straightforward BPA plastic-free reusable drinking bottles, which is noble, given our climatic pickle, but not especially cool. But then there are the collaborations: partnerships with the hottest names in streetwear that have made Nalgene the go-to bottle for hype kids and serious outdoor types alike. There have been sold-out collabs with Supreme, Brain Dead, JJJJound, And Wander, Bape and Online Ceramics, among others-all of whom are trying to espouse their concern for plastic waste while gleaning a little of Nalgene’s adventurous authenticity. “It’s a legit product in its own right,” Josh Rothery, buyer at Outsiders Store, an…

At 56, already decades into an A-list career, Chris Rock is rebooting the Saw franchise. He nailed the fourth season of Fargo. He’s directing again. He’s writing more jokes. The man might just be trying to live forever. He stops on a pedestrian island to let traffic pass on Houston Street, and in that brief wait, I wonder if the people in the trundling cars spy one of the most famous comedians on earth under his mask and transition-lens glasses. No one, though, drops the window to shout his name or honk or jab an index in astonishment-Chris Rock granted a reprieve from living famous 24/7/365. Rock, who’s dressed casual in a hoodie and cargo pants and white Reebok Classic trainers, troops a half step ahead of me, a Tumi…

It’s been there for some time now. Lingering in the distance. Hanging in the air, like humidity on a stormy day. That feeling that after more than a year in a state of suspended reality, there’s change just beyond the horizon. At the time of sending this issue to press, Singapore was plunged back into a lockdown of sorts. Almost a year to the date that circuit breaker ended the first time around, here we are again. Thankfully, the rate of vaccinations, as well as our preparedness, has helped to fend off the worst (at least for now). And besides, we can taste the sea change on the horizon. We’re used to all of this Covid-safe brouhaha now, so instead of getting caught up in the dullness of it all,…

When Christian Selmoni mentioned, over the Zoom conference we were having, that American 1921 is regarded as an antique watch today, I experienced a brief moment of cognitive dissonance. Not to his point, of course. The style and heritage director of Vacheron Constantin was making perfect sense. But when you’re looking at a timeless, elegant wristwatch like the American 1921-smooth like a pebble, with a peculiar yet no less rakish off-centred dial-you’d easily understand why I was struggling to call it ancient. Selmoni says, “To really understand the American 1921, we have to put ourselves in the spirit of the ’20s, the Roaring ’20s. A time of total creativity, total freedom, it was all about extravaganza. This was also the era of the dandies, so the watch with its unusual…

In his esteemed and long career in fashion, Raf Simons has demonstrated a fairly impeccable catalogue of influences. His clothes have referenced Kraftwerk, Le Corbusier’s furniture designer Jean Prouvé and the 1981 German arthouse movie Christiane F. Also, the lyrics of Leonard Cohen, the cinematography of Alfred Hitchcock and the still lifes of Flemish Renaissance painter Jan Brueghel the Elder. Yet rarely has a connection been made between Simons’s work and Peanuts. “It makes me think of Linus,” says Andrew Groves, professor of fashion design at the University of Westminster, London, referring to Linus van Pelt, Charlie Brown’s blanket-wielding best mate. Groves is talking about Simons’s recently launched retail platform, History of My World-a new departure selling candles, books and homewear. Most notably, a set of 45 wool blankets. An…

A sandwich used to be a simple thing. The sandwiches you carried to school in a lunch box, the sandwiches you wolfed down after school in front of the TV-they were never meant to be examples of extravagance or creative disruption. Three or four ingredients did the trick. Bread, ham, cheese, mustard. Bread, turkey, cheese, mayonnaise. Bread, jelly, peanut butter. Overstuffing them ruined them. Think of a sandwich prized for its thinness, a sandwich made with one slice of meat and one slice of cheese, a sandwich so compact and slim that it can be consumed easily with one hand while the other hand steers a bicycle. We have, in the past decade or so, moved in a different direction from that. ‘Reinvent everything’ has been the mantra among restaurant…

Among the many competitive sports in the world, basketball has become more than just a game. It’s a cultural institution in its own right. Even if you don’t follow the sport or keep tabs on the happenings in and within NBA, you’d at least be familiar with the likes of Michael Jordan, Kobe Bryant and Lebron James-icons whose presence off the courts was just as impactful as in-game scenarios. Or at the very least, you’re currently sporting a pair of sneakers inspired by basketball shoes. Whether it’s a pair of Air Jordans or adidas Forums, what was once designed for ultimate performance during a basketball game is now part of the streetwear lexicon. And with all things streetwear, the influence has spilled over into luxury fashion. Italian fashion house Gucci…

As a 40-year-old guy who’s on dating apps and Twitter to a pathological degree, I find the concept of seeking help with one’s mental health a surprisingly pervasive part of my life. “Men would rather than go to therapy,” as the Twitter joke goes, with any combination of delusion, denial and destruction (comma, self) filling in the blank. Even before I went, I was completely in agreement with this line of thinking-other men really did need therapy. But not me. Sure, I had a raft of coping mechanisms-drinking, ignoring my problems and, if things were really going bad, shaving my head. And if this feels like some classic ‘Man who thinks he’s sensitive avoiding processing his negative feelings’ sh*t, then, yes, you’re right. The beginning and end of my thoughts…

ESQUIRE: What sparked your involvement in the Life in Edo | Russel Wong in Kyoto exhibition? RUSSEL WONG: It came as a two-pronged approach. Life in Edo was conceptualised by JCC [Japan Creative Centre] that had a curator for the woodblock collection. At the same time, Kennie Ting [Asian Civilisation Museum’s museum director] saw my previous exhibition on [Kenzō Tange’s] architecture at the JCC. There I spoke about my project on documenting the geisha and geiko for about 12 years. This was 2019. Ting proposed to do this together [with the woodblocks] to have a contrast and also duality for the exhibition. One having woodblocks from old Edo. And another having also with history, but shot with and done in the medium of photography at the present time which has…

If there’s one thing for certain during these rather uncertain times, it’s that our lifestyles have completely changed. We’re no longer commuting as much as we used to and there’s a constant insatiable yearning for the outdoors-the latter perhaps is an indirect consequence of the former. For Braun Büffel, that has meant reconfiguring its selections and offerings for the season. Instead of the brand creating a separate spring/summer 2021 collection, its latest range serves as an extension of that of the autumn/winter 2020 season, at once moving away from the traditional seasonal calendar and ensuring that its designs make sense for the times we’re living in. Braun Büffel is calling the overarching theme ‘Back to the Origin’. And it’s as simple as it sounds. While refocusing on its core brand…

ESQUIRE: Let’s talk about your collaboration with Moncler, from the first project to the present. How has it evolved before the Genius initiative? CRAIG GREEN: As a brand, Moncler is so direct about what they’re about, like their heritage, down jacket and wardrobe classics so it’s a brand that I really respect a lot. Take their iconic structure: regardless of the wearer, they strap these blankets around them, which led to that Moncler classic down shape. It’s amazing. We’ve worked with Moncler for, I think, almost five years now, and it’s a collaboration that I really love. We first started with capsule releases for a year before working on the Genius initiative. I was the one player with the brand that is all about functionality at its core, which is…

The way we see it, 2021 is at least looking to be more positive than the uncertain realities of the previous year. We’re getting vaccinated, travel bubbles are in the process of happening the world over, and there are concrete plans on opening up economies once again. The fashion industry may be in a bit of a disarray-fashion houses began internally restructuring their business models during the height of the pandemic-but one thing that remains consistent is in the way fashion often reflects our lived realities. While it may be easy to create collections that speak to a rather bleak future, fashion has always championed positivity. And we definitely could do with some. It’s not that designers are out of touch with reality, but rather, they’d sooner choose to create…

My mouth is wet against her neck. Her taste-the oil, the sweat, whatever it is-it’s like lime sucked right off the rind. And I can’t get enough. But I’m not really there. I’m far away, up in the rafters somewhere. I’m watching him turn her over. She’s moaning, waking up with his tongue in her mouth. His hands scrape down her bare back, he claws away her shorts, and then he presses himself into place when she asks, “Are you awake?” “Uh...yes,” he says with a greedy self-assurance. He goes to penetrate, but she stops him. She can tell. Sitting up, she watches as the space behind his eyes begins to light up. The grin goes away. He recedes. I come to. We’re in my bedroom. It’s three on a…

There is no door separating the bedroom from the living room in my 60-square-metre apartment, where my husband, Mark, and I have spent the past year together. It’s not like we were having problems qua problems when I picked up a hardcover copy of the 1992 self-help bestseller Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus: A Practical Guide for Improving Communication and Getting What You Want in Your Relationships, by John Gray, PhD, but after a year of quarantine, we weren’t exactly in any position to be turning down marital advice in any form. Not to mention, Mark had recently started saying “Cool, cool, cool” every time one of his co-workers asked him to do anything, a habit I loathe. I don’t want to kill him, but I don’t…

Aeroplanes looked different in the 1950s-the golden age of flying, as we now know it. Back then, travelling through the skies was nothing short of a grand affair. In fact, almost 70 years on, Ed Freeman still remembers his first journey. It was 16 hours from Boston to London. That’s almost 10 hours more than it’d take today-I imagine because we no longer need to stop at Nova Scotia, Iceland and Ireland to refuel. “Pretty primitive,” Freeman describes. “Of course, we didn’t know any better. We thought, right, I can fly to London instead of taking a boat, wow!” He was 16 at the time when his parents handed him a passport and a bit of cash and sent him off to see the world-in hindsight, an experience which he’d…